fellow Ontario Members

[vic622]

Originally Posted by SirJamieson

Hey everyone. Brantford ON here, but I work in Burlington and head to the GTA every once in a while.

Reading through this thread, there have been a lot of good suggestions for LFS stores to check out. I always worry about the smaller stores and tend to stick to the Big Al's, but it sounds like I should be doing the opposite.

I'm setting up a Caribbean reef, and I was hoping to get some yellow-headed jawfish and eventually a cherub angel, and I was a little worried about ordering online and having livestock shipped to Ontario from who knows where.

I wouldn't want to be accused of speaking ill of the big box stores .... however, I've never seen livestock as healthy at them as at almost any of the smaller LFS.

In fact, the healthiest fish have been at the "smaller than the corner store", mom & pop LFS - without exception.

The trick is, it takes a bit of work on your part, you have to ask around & look around to find out who's good & who's not so good - then stick to them like glue!

Oh yeah, ordering (livestock) online - I've ordered hardware, inverts & coral & not had any problems. I haven't ordered fish. The thing is you have no idea of their condition & the freight is usually brutal unless you order a lot!
Even when I lived 3hrs from Calgary, I still found it worth it to take a Saturday to go there, do my general shopping, do my fish shopping & maybe visit some friends & come back that night. I could usually do that & spread the gas cost across all the shopping and come out ahead of ordering livestock online + I got to visit the fish stores, ask questions & chose the stock I wanted!